Spread the Love, Please

I love the blogworld. I love reading blogs, discovering new ones and adding my own two bits too. I love it so much that I kick myself for not finding myself a place on it earlier. Anyway, better late than never.

Now, there are a few blogs out there that put the 'zip' in my 'zippety-do-dah'. Parul's blog is one of them and it has been nominated in the Best Personal Indiblog category. Do go over and vote for her. PLEASE!! If anyone deserves it, she does!

While voting for her, I noticed two other nominations that deserve all the support that they can get; Indian Homemaker in the Best Humanities Indiblog category and IndieQuill for the Best Entertainment Indiblog category.

Lots of other popular blogs are up for nominations in various categories. Go on and show them all your love. Here. Please. Thanks!

The One With Noddy In It: The YO's 3rd Birthday Party

Sigh...

That's right, I'm starting off this one with a sigh.

This is the long over-due birthday party post. The one with Noddy in it. The one where my YO turns three. The one where my little one leaves his toddlerhood behind him.

Before I start describing the party, I need to draw out a little table. Of birthdays in my family. Birthdays that are celebrated before the YO's birthday.
September: Bro, YO, SIL, the MIM
October: the Neice, Maa-Janoni, BIL
That's seven...yup, count 'em, SEVEN big birthdays, bashes, cake cuttings, Happy Birthday 'singing' et al, that happen before the YO's, (Okay, maybe not the Bro's but the rest...yups!) Add to that the fact that the entire population seems to have procreated during the winter months (finding pleasurable ways to keep warm, I'm guessing...what, blankets not enough for you folks?!?) and thus spawned in the fall, the majority of birthday parties seem to fall in the fall! So with all these birthdays happening all over the world and Jupiter, the YO was getting desperate for his own bash...with his own friends and his own cake and his own khoi bag, with a 'Happy Birthday' song just for him.

Words can not do justice to portray his impatience. Everyday he'd wake up and ask me, "Aajge aamaar budday?" (Today's my budday?) The same question, at least 150 times through the course of the day. His little face falling each time he was told it wasn't but not enough to deter him from asking me yet again after fifteen minutes. As if by sheer dint of his perseverance, the answer would be different this time round.

And then, it happened. After more than a month of being told, "Naa babu, aajke naa, aashchey" (No sweetheart, not today, it's coming)...it happened. The sparkle left his eyes and the anticipation died.

When he woke up that morning and I kissed him and hugged him and wished him a big, jolly 'Happy Birthday', he just asked me, "Aajge aamaar budday?" and I squeezed him tight and said "Yes, my baby, yes!! Aajke tomaar budday!!", he just nodded sagely and got down from my lap. I think I died a little.

The YO's birthday is on the 17th of October. This time, it coincided with Diwali so we decided to have the party on the 15th, even though Maa-Janoni and the MIM's parents weren't in town. It was the MIM's decision actually. It was breaking his heart to see how badly the YO wanted to celebrate his birthday. I now think we should have celebrated it two weeks earlier, while he was still excited! Anyway, while I had taken Diwali into account, I'd forgotten about Dhanteras, which explains why 70% of the YO's class was MIA. I'm not ashamed to say that I was upset and angry as hell!

We had chosen Timezone as the party venue...a place kids LOVE!! Video games for different age groups, a toy train, rocking animals, cars and planes, a minuscule bowling alley, a tiny merry-go-round and a small kids area.

Now normally, the YO runs amok here. But somehow, that day, his heart just wasn't in it. He saw his friends come in bearing gifts of love, but all he wanted was to be carried by either me, the MIM or his ayah.

It was killing me to see him so distant, cranky and disinterested. All the kids and their parents!, were playing the various video games and having fun. All the kids except my little one. Wasn't anything going to change his mood?

And then...it happened! The smiles...the whoops of delight...the sparkle in his eyes and the excitement. When my DaddyDearest walked in with the cake. One look at the pastry pieces of Noddy and Big Ears sitting in a marzipan and chocolate sponge Noddy car cake and my little boy was jumping up and down with excitement. He refused to leave it's side and watched over it...as if he was guarding over the treasures of Fort Knox; as if he was an M4 watching over her EO and YO.

When it was finally time to cut the cake, I was actually a bit worried about the YO. I was hoping and praying that we be spared a tantrum of YO-tuan proportions when it came to the actual, physical cutting of the cake...and luckily, the gods heard my prayers! Amidst much clapping, singing and blowing of candles, and with loving help from the EO, the Nephew and the Neice, my YO happily cut his cake. He was now ready to eat and party!

Aahhh! Happy times were here again! The menu was simple...pizzas, non-veg momos, veg spring rolls, veg noodles with a non-veg or veg side-dish, and of course, the cake! After the eatings and drinkings there was much more playings to be done and this time my happy little YO joined in with great gusto!

So many friends made this day special. A big shout-out to bloggy Sue who was there with her Vicks and the heart-meltingly gorgeous Bhablet, as well as to the MIM's BFF who happened to be down from London. Equally special mention to me made of friends P and J (hehehe...PJ!), who catered the food and more so to J, whose birthday it 'really' was! (See! Another one of them fall babies!)

Back home, the presents were attacked with much respect. The MIM had gone out with said BFF and I looked on indulgently at the mess my boys created, their shrieks of delight like music to my ears, especially the YO's.

It was a happy birthday after all!

A Birthday Wish and a Thought

Happy birthday to the first man in my life -- DaddyDearest. Having you live so close to me is knowing that my slice of peace and bliss are near. You're the bestest, daddy, and I wish for you a life free from aches, pains and worries. I wish for you peace of mind, contentment and huge large chunks of happy! Love you!

**************************************************

Dear YO,

You know, today you are exactly as old as your brother was when you came into his life. I don't know why, but I can't stop thinking about this little statistic and it's been on my mind for the past few weeks.

Perhaps it's because that time is a blur to me. I was so busy wrapping my brains around the fact that I was a mommy of two, that I seem to have missed out on precious moments with the both of you. Looking at you now, I seem to be getting a sense of what your brother may have been like at that time.

Or perhaps it's because you suddenly seem to have gone baby-crazy. You see a baby on TV and you're riveted. When you can finally tear your eyes away long enough, you shriek at the top of your voice, "Dekho! Dekho! Baby, baby, BABY!" Then this time at the pujo pandal, and even more recently at a birthday party, you just wanted to be with the baby there. You wanted to pick her up in your arms, carry her around, sit her down on your lap and just plain drink in the essence of her delightful baby smell and revel in being the big boy. It's almost like you're trying to tell me that you're ready to be a big brother.

Or perhaps all this wistful reminiscing is because you're growing up WAY too fast for me, my little one. I miss your chubby hands and dimpled thighs. I miss the gurgles and the coos and the cuddles.

I miss your babyhood, my baby.

Love,
Mamma

I Wish I Had a Camera Today

Which is very ironic, as I was wishing this wish in a photographer's studio where I had taken the YO to get a passport-size snap clicked.

I think the photographer clicked about a dozen snaps before she finally got one right (or rather, one which I half-heartedly approved!!) All the ones before deserve to be put up in a Funny Faces Hall of Fame...each expression more Court Jester than the last! And what comedic timing! Just as the photographer would say, "Smile" and press down on the shutter, he'd transform from well-behaved school-boy complete with side-parting in hair, to YO the Comical, YO the Horrid, YO the Prince of Imps. Either he'd squint his eyes, roll his eyes side-ways, give us a toothy grin complete with a thumbs-up sign or he'd squeal 'Cheese' or 'Banana Pudding' and then break out in a buck-toothed grin!!

Yes, yes! It all sounds delightful and adorable and oh-so howlarious! But you should have been there...

to see just how much!

Happy Children's Day

My beloved EO and YO,

Yesterday was Children's Day and think I wished you both at least 22 times during the course of the day. While"Happy Children's Day, my boys" were the wishes spoken out loud, here are the unspoken wishes that I have for you.

This Children's Day, I wish for you a mother with an abundance of patience.
This Children's Day, I wish for you a father with an abundance of energy.
This Children's Day, I wish for you music and joy and evenings of cricket, cycling and friends. I wish for you bags full of giggles, boxes full of chuckles and truck-loads of hearty, belly-aching laughter. I wish for you funny faces and potty jokes. I wish for you cheeks flushed with good health, mouths full of good food and eyes full of love and twinkles.

This Children's Day, my loves, I wish for you, your precious childhood.
I love you both...biggest.
Mamma

And to my dear bloggy-mommies...I wish the same for your blessed children. I wish the same for all the children.

Today was not...

...the EO's day. He wasn't allowed to have his tiffin (small break as well as big break) because he didn't finish his classwork. Add to that his Mamma's disappointment when she finds out and marches his tiny little butt back to class and quickly makes him copy down what on the board (i.e. she scribbles it hastily in the back of his book because she knows that left to him, they'd be there till the bell rang for school next morning!!). Add to that Mamma's frustration upon learning that he lost his eraser...the third so far...this week! Add to that his discovery that his diary had been taken home by the boy who sits nest to him in class.

All the way home, he encounters Mamma's stony silence.

He looks forward to his much-loved cricket class and gets ready with great enthu. Mamma and younger brother drop him off and come to pick him up, ten minutes early.

EO is mortified that they arrive just in time to see him being punished...standing on the side of the 'field' holding his ears while the other boys practise their bowling techniques.

Mamma, (having been informed by the Nephew that he was 'punished' in a similar manner during the last cricket class as well) is at first shocked and then angry. Angry that she is paying good money to have someone else punish her son when she is perfectly capable herself.

Then Mamma mellows. Her heart begins to melt as she sees the small figure of her little boy, standing there, pulling at his own ears, while trying to scratch a knee with foot as he's prime mosquito bait, standing there instead of running about.

So on the way back, Mamma decides to stop at the new patisserie to buy some sinfully delicious and rich chocolate Mud Slices to cheer them up. (let's not dwell on the fact that Mamma had been craving these herself ever since she came to know of their existence). When EO sees Mamma getting into the car with tell-tale box, his heart shines through in his smile.

By the time the pj's are on her EO, Mamma's heart has become a gooey replica of the warm centre of the Mud Slice. She decides to give EO a treat.

She takes out a hand-made paper notebook. Five years ago, Mamma had started writing stories about her EO and Nephew. It has gone the way of many of Mamma's literary aspirations and is lying incomplete in a drawer with many others of its kind.

Mamma decides to read out the first half of chapter one. She then kisses EO good-night and walks out of the room.

She is called back to the room by a sobbing EO, who grabs her and hugs her in a tight bear-hug and refuses to let her go.

My poor child. The whole day his heart was on the verge of breaking thanks to one thing going wrong after another. Who knew that he would be overwhelmed enough by an unfinished story that his Mamma wrote about him five years ago.

Maybe this blog is not being written in vain after all...I don't know, I can only hope and pray.

One thing I do know for sure is that there's this story that needs to be completed...

M4 is in raptures.

They were like gazelles, leaping across the stage. Their effortless grace, youthful beauty and absolute surrender to the supreme artform took my breath away and left me a blubbering, sobbing mess in the auditorium.

I have been so moved after ages.

A perfectly executed Odissi recital does that to me.

It always does.

Are You Frikkin' Kidding Me?!?!?!?!?!

WARNING: The following post is about something I read in the papers today that left me sick and shaking with rage for almost the whole day. It may do the same to you. So why am I writing about it? Because we all have children whom we love and would do anything to protect. Because I think that we have a responsibility to each other and we need to let each other know what kind of sick crap there is out there, ready to corrupt our angels, our innocents.

I read with absolute HORROR, in fact 'horror' doesn't even begin to describe what I'm feeling, about this video game created in Japan called RapeLay...a 3D 'rape simulator' video game where one gets to pretend to be a sexual predator and test out his 'raping skills' on a mom and her two teenage daughters!!!!!!


It has been banned in Japan...thankfully! It has, unfortunately, found its way into India.


One more reason why I will NOT be apologetic about monitoring all my sons' activities as they grow up. And I don't need any bull-crap statements about violating my children's privacy and if I have faith in the way I've brought them up, then I shouldn't worry about them getting into bad company or doing bad things.


The thing is, I do have faith in the way the MIM and I are bringing up our boys. I do believe in, strongly, the morals and values that we are trying to impart to them with every constant moment of living. But what freaks the shittin' daylights out of me is that the world is full of bad people, freaks, paedophiles and wackos who think it's okay to create a video game where you can rape a woman and her daughters repeatedly until you break them to the point where they are willing to become your sex slaves.

The world is full of predators of various kinds who are ready to kill our children's innocence, corrupt them any chance they get. It is our responsibility, duty and right to protect our children any way we deem fit.

What a shitty world.

God. I am so scared.

A Nightmare in London

"London Dreams." A misnomer if ever there was one. I mean, dreams are supposed to be pleasant, right? Well, this one soooooo wasn't! We actually saw this with friends last Friday and I'm still waking up shrieking as bits and pieces, feviquiked to my inner mind, suddenly pop out to haunt me!

That it was bad, you can probably get from my opening para, but just how wishing-for-a-migraine-attack-so-that-my-head-is-pleasantly-occupied bad, you can't even begin to fathom. Not even in your wildest nightmare, err, dream!

What made it so god-awful, well, 'let me count the ways'.

1. For starters, Ajay Devgn (no, that's not a typo, that's how he spells it now). Now don't get me wrong, I have no major issues with the guy. In fact, thanks to his portrayal of Bhagat Singh, I quite like the guy. But for some crazy reason, he's begun to think that he can pull off comedy. Yo! Jay! I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you can't! Not that this movie was a comedy, but I needed to get that out of the way.
   Here's the thing though, if you've been noticing his last few movies, it almost looks as if he's trying to reclaim his lost youth. This has to be said...Jay, you were too old for this movie. This role deserved a younger actor, and you, my friend, were so not it!
2. Which brings me to fogey #2, Salman Khan. Where do I begin? Yikes!! Crass, crude, ridiculous and, and..errrr...oh yes -- OLD!!
   What were the makers of this film thinking when they were handing out the parts? Yes, of course there was the mandatory shirt-taking-off scene and his body still looks pretty darned good, but the rest of the package? Bloated! Been hitting the bottle, my friend?
   I mean, come on, if you're gonna plan a "Rock On!" type of movie, at least get your band of brothers right!
3. Which in turn brings me to it being a pale, sad, pathetic shadow of "Rock On!" They tried so hard to copy from perfection and instead ended up massacring it, like a botched-up boob-job.
4. I mean, they even had a Farhan Akhtar look-a-like, frizzy hair and all. Now he was cute and all, and had I still been in school uniform I would have totally kissed his poster and all that, but baby-doll, a Farhan Akhtar you ain't!
5. The weaker-than-my-grandma's-punch story-line. Let's not even go there. It was the hastily done patch-up job to cover up the botched-up boob-job.
6. Asin. She's pretty. Pretty dumb. And that's how she came across. And Lolita-like relationships just make me really uncomfortable. I get all squeamish when they are forcefully inflicted upon me. And the recent Bollywood trend of pairing these uncle types with a fresh pair of boobs is really nauseating. You have Sanju baba (who should really be rechristened Sanju dadu) rolling around in the sand with a clearly desperate-for-any-role Lara Dutta in the recently made 'Blue', and in this movie you have AD and SK lusting after Asin. What's the matter guys? Overdoing the testosterone shots? Not getting any at home? Well whatever the reason, stop pawing these toddlers in mini-skirts! It's ugly!
7. And what's with the whipping?!?!?!?! DUDE!!!! I mean, seriously!! I mean WTF!! I mean DUDE!!!!!! That was soooooo a bad lift from "The DaVinci Code"! And it was so, so, soooo...DUDE!!!

You know, I can go on. But I don't want to nit-pick, because I can really go on forever!

This movie ranks on my "Top Ten Worst Big-Screen Disasters Ever" list at #2! Come to think of it, it may even rank somewhere on my list of "Top Ten Stupidest Mistakes I Ever Made"!!

Yes, good people, that bad. Only worse!